


day by day

by bazookajo94



Series: we were together [2]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Chess, Easthaven, M/M, Medicated Andrew Minyard, POV Andrew Minyard, Rehabilitation, Scars, Soft Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard, andrew makes a deal with neil and it's a winky face deal, neil meets andrew at easthaven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:21:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25983520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bazookajo94/pseuds/bazookajo94
Summary: “Sometimes it can help to give pieces of ourselves to strangers, because it feels like they don’t really know us to judge us. Is that how you feel around Andrew?”“Not really. Am I supposed to feel that way around you?”“Some people do. How do you feel around me, Neil?”“I feel like this is a big waste of time, and Andrew isn’t a stranger.”“Then is he a friend?”
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Series: we were together [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1858567
Comments: 34
Kudos: 736





	1. i

**Author's Note:**

> hi i finally did it because i really love being in this universe and i just couldn't stop thinking about this au. it started out not what i wanted, and then it was what i wanted, and then i was satisfied, so i hope you are, too
> 
> some things to keep in mind for this:  
> i don't really know how andrew would be rehabilitated (or anything about mental institutions at all), so i did my best handling his drug and withdrawal situation, and i'm sorry if i'm wrong.  
> i also did my best to reconcile neil's demisexuality with the fact that he's not actually adverse to kissing and make sure that andrew didn't feel like he was taking advantage of neil while still getting some sexytimes  
> also sexytimes? i don't usually write that so sorry if it's awkward lmao

It was two days after Andrew checked into Easthaven that he realized something wasn’t right with Neil Josten. Despite the haze his recovering mind swam through each day he suffered through withdrawal and rehabilitation, Andrew knew something wasn’t right about Neil’s admittance to the mental hospital.

Neil seemed one second away from bolting from the premises, though he never left. He constantly snapped at anyone—patient, nurse, or otherwise—who tried to help him. He ate every meal like it was his first and last he’d ever have.

He liked to run when he had free time. He never spoke to anyone he wasn’t forced to. He was distractingly pretty, even from the across-the-room distance Andrew only ever saw him from.

Andrew’s notice of Neil officially peaked when he overheard a nurse calmly telling Neil that if he had admitted himself, he obviously wanted some form of help, and she could be that for him. Neil stormed off to his room, and Andrew, constantly nauseous and unsure if the way he felt was from the aftereffects of the drugs or if he really was feeling, found it so very interestingthat a man who so clearly didn’t want to be here had checked himself in.

Andrew didn’t _need_ a reason to find out more about the only other attractive boy his age at the hospital, but it certainly helped. He felt like he found a new toy.

Perhaps he wouldn’t be so bored here, after all.

*

Neil knew something wasn’t right when he returned to his room that night because, though his door was closed, it wasn’t latched. He hadn’t thought any of the staff or patients were a threat, but then Neil recalled the short, buff, blonde man with a wobbling crazed smile and a dead look in his eyes who often tracked him when he crossed a room. Neil had wondered when he would finally make a move.

Heaving a soft sigh, Neil opened his door like he wasn’t afraid. The man—Neil was pretty sure his name was Andrew—was sprawled on his bed. Well, as much as he could be in a bed that size. He was sitting against the wall with his back resting on Neil’s pillows, one leg stretched in front of him and the other bent. Andrew rested his forearm on his knee and his jaw on his forearm, and he didn’t react at all when Neil entered his room and didn’t turn on the light, even though it was nine o’clock and most patients were supposed to be in their own rooms by now.

They both stared at each other for a long time before Neil spoke. “What do you want?” Neil asked. He didn’t close his door behind him.

Andrew cocked his head. His fractured smile was absent, and Neil wondered if it was a drugged smile or if Andrew just wasn’t as amused at night as he was during the day.

“What do you want?” Andrew parroted, lax in his offense, which only made Neil’s discomfort raise more. Neil didn’t know what he was supposed to do. He wasn’t putting himself through admitting himself to the hospital so he could suffer a power play with some manic patient at a mental hospital.

“You’re not supposed to be in here. Get out.”

“Or what? You’ll tell on me? Tsk, tsk, Neil.” Andrew shook his head, and the movement caused his bottom lip to catch and drag across his own arm. Neil, uncomfortable and suddenly unsure of why he was being antagonized but unable to back down, crossed his arms. Frowned.

“What do you want?” he asked again.

“To play a game,” Andrew answered, and then he slowly unfurled himself, like a cat, and Neil’s gaze caught on the pale skin on Andrew’s arms when they moved. He tracked the familiar lines and mentally pushed them aside to process later, and then watched as Andrew noticed where Neil’s attention had gone and quickly turned his arms inward, hiding the scars. When Neil met Andrew’s gaze again, Andrew’s face was blank and Neil was smug but unsmiling. Despite the situation, Neil knew what it was like to hide scars. He didn’t comment.

He said, “I don’t want to play a game with you.”

“I don’t think you have much of a choice.”

Neil normally would have fought that sentiment, but part of the reason he had checked himself into Easthaven was because of the lack of choice—for himself or anyone who tried to take him. Even though he hated it, Neil hadn’t eaten this much or slept so deep in a very long time. As the days passed, Neil found he was almost tired enough to not care about anything anymore.

Almost.

Even though he scowled, Neil asked for the third time, “What do you want?”

Andrew shrugged. He was still sitting on Neil’s bed, his feet on the floor now, so he was too short to intimidate, yet Neil still felt apprehensive at the intensity Andrew exuded. He wasn’t like the other patients, even with his smile and his eyes. Neil didn’t know what to do.

“I want to know why someone with so little regard for this place willingly checked himself in.”

Furious, Neil dropped his crossed arms and clenched his hands into fists. “How do you know that?”

Andrew lifted a hand and started ticking off his fingers, as if reciting from a document: “Josten, comma, Neil. Age nineteen. Self-admitted three days ago. DOB: March thirty first.”

Andrew had read his file. “Are you fucking kidding me? You had no right to do that!” What else was on there? Neil didn’t say much in his sessions with his therapists because he wanted the negative behavior to reflect poorly, so they’d force him to stay longer. Not that Neil needed to use that as incentive to not talk about himself to people he didn’t know and who wouldn’t understand. Still, he didn’t like that Andrew had somehow gotten access to his file and might know anything about him at all, even if everything in that file was a lie.

Seeming pleased that he got a reaction out of Neil, Andrew stood and brushed nonexistent dust off his pants. They all worse the same clothes here: soft white pants and a matching white shirt, no pockets. “‘No right,’ he says. Expected freedom in a place like this, did you?”

Neil kept his mouth shut, seething.

“What do you want?” Andrew asked for him, mocking, taking a step forward. Neil took a step back. Andrew paused, as if waiting for an answer, and then he checked Neil’s shoulder as he left his room.

Neil didn’t sleep that night.

*

The next day, Neil walked into the main room and found Andrew sitting at a table with a chess board in front of him. Suddenly exhausted, even though he just woke up, Neil moved to sit in front of the table.

Andrew stared at Neil as he made his way to the chess board. He didn’t seem as manic this morning as he usually did, but it was about an hour before the people who took medication were forced to take it. Neil wondered, if it really was medication that made Andrew so unhinged, why he was forced to take it?

As soon as Neil took his spot in front of the chess board, Andrew moved a pawn to start the game. Neil raised a brow. Andrew had set up the table so that the white pieces were in front of Neil and black in front of Andrew.

“I thought white went first?” Neil asked, but he didn’t really care and moved a pawn. He had never played chess with any sort of strategy in mind, and today was no different. He wondered how seriously Andrew was going to play.

“It’s twenty twenty, Neil.”

Neil rolled his eyes.

He thought Andrew had set up this game so he could interrogate Neil more, but they played in silence until Andrew finally took one of Neil’s pieces, and then he asked, “Why does your file say you checked in with brown eyes?”

Neil’s fists clenched at the reminder that Andrew had read his file, but he now understood how this game was played. Fine.

Neil moved another piece, teeth locked tight as he bit out a response: “I used to wear colored contacts.”

A few more plays in silence, and then Andrew took another piece. “Why did you check yourself in?” he asked.

Neil wished he was better at chess. He could tell just from his cursory glance now that they were reaching the point in the game where pieces were going to be lost every turn. Neil didn’t know how he would survive this. Breathing around the hatred in his chest, Neil answered, “It’s safer than being out there.”

Thankfully, his next turn, Neil was able to take one of Andrew’s. But _he_ hadn’t spent half the night formulating this elaborate game of Q&A, so he wasn’t sure what to ask and felt a little put upon. “Um. How long are you in for?” He almost cringed at the horridity of his lame question, but he did want to know how much longer he had to put up with this charade.

Andrew didn’t waste time taking another one of Neil’s pieces while he answered, “Until I get better.”

God, Neil hated chess.

*

Their game only lasted thirty minutes and Neil had skirted close to the truth in a lot of his answers. He was on the run (but didn’t say what from). He was paying for his own treatment from the money he stole on the run (but didn’t specify that his mother had actually stolen it before they escaped). He was coming from Baltimore (true). He would leave when it was no longer safe to stay (true). Patients who check themselves in can check themselves out.

He didn’t know much more about Andrew than he had before the start of the game: he was here rehabilitating. He was on prescribed drugs that he had become addicted to, and he was being weaned off his drugs to help with withdrawal, so he still had to take them, just in smaller doses each day. His drugs were court ordered. They had been court ordered so he wouldn’t go to jail.

Andrew remained vague with most of his answers, just as Neil did, but while Neil grew visibly annoyed, Andrew remained impassive and apathetic.

At the end of the game, even though Andrew had won and Neil couldn’t take anymore pieces, Neil asked, “What do you want?” because Andrew still hadn’t answered him that and Neil still wanted to know.

By then it was time for medication. Andrew stood up, leaving Neil to put away their board. He said, “Come find me tonight and I’ll tell you.”

_Great,_ Neil thought, sighing as he started tossing pieces in the box. He didn’t know if the drop in his stomach was dread or, helplessly, intrigue.

*

Andrew hated this place.

The constant haze his mind resided in only seemed to lessen when he actively focused on something, but there was nothing in him or around him that was interesting enough to focus on. Not even Neil, who mostly didn’t seem real, just another piece of the fog, another flicker in the mist.

Andrew found himself midafternoon bowed over a toilet, alone and in the dark because he hadn’t turned on the light when he came crashing in, his throat raw from vomiting through another stage of his withdrawal. He was gasping, and he hated it here, and he was laughing, and he hated it here, and he remembered the heat of blue in Neil’s eyes as Andrew asked him questions he didn’t want to answer.

Andrew was dry heaving, and he was convulsing, hands no longer strong enough to hold himself up, and he felt warm all over as he lay on the cold bathroom tile and thought about Neil’s eyes.

And he _hated_ it here, but he knew of one way he could occupy his time.

*

Neil didn’t know how he was supposed to “come find” Andrew that night. Was he supposed to break into his room, like Andrew had done? The halls were monitored after the patients were told to go to bed, and while it would be easy enough to figure out the nurses’ schedules and sneak around them, Neil didn’t care about any of this to put that much energy into his curiosity. Maybe he’d run into Andrew; maybe he wouldn’t.

An hour before lights out and Neil walked into the main room to find Andrew sitting in front of a chess board again. Neil hadn’t seen Andrew all day, too busy avoiding him and his therapists, but for some reason he wasn’t surprised to see Andrew here again, waiting for him. He walked up to the table, but Andrew had only put the black bishop and the white queen on the board.

“Pretty sure I’ll win this way,” Neil commented lightly as he sat down. Andrew shrugged. He looked pale, and his eyes were bloodshot and vacant. His drugs must be wearing off for the night. Neil started moving his piece, and Andrew began his retreat. Neil thought this was a stupid way to play, but neither of them spoke until Neil finally cornered the bishop and it was gone.

“I can help you,” Andrew said.

Neil’s head snapped up, confused. “What?”

Andrew removed the two pieces and set out two more random opponents: a white knight and a black queen.

“If you stay while I’m here,” Andrew went on, moving his queen nonsensically around the board.

“What?” Neil asked again.

“I’ll protect you if you stay while I’m here.” In a completely illegal move, Andrew moved his queen over to Neil’s knight and smacked the piece so hard it flew across the room. When Andrew set his queen down, he didn’t move his hand away, and Neil, his hand having just been relieved of its knight, felt the heat from Andrew’s hand. Neil looked up to meet Andrew’s gaze, his eyes wide. He couldn’t tell if the flutter in his stomach was fear or…something else.

“In exchange for what?” Neil asked, his voice quiet.

A flash of Andrew’s manic smile, though he looked tired. Neil couldn’t tell if it was real or not, if anything about Andrew was real. “Aren’t you so bored here, Neil?” he drawled, and then he moved his fingers as if to touch Neil. He paused just before, waiting until Neil looked up at him.

Neil didn’t know how to answer. He felt very warm suddenly, throat dry, chest hot, and he knew what Andrew would ask for, was surprised he was asking—and surprised that he himself wasn’t as put off by the idea as he thought. He didn’t have very many good experiences with…this, but perhaps now was a good time to experiment. His mother was dead, and Neil didn’t have much time left, even with the protection of Easthaven and, if he agreed, Andrew. Neither of them expected to be here very long, anyway, and, well. Neil _was_ so very bored here.

“Yes,” he whispered, and Andrew started to trail his fingers lightly up Neil’s hand, his forearm, stopping at the sensitive skin of his inner elbow.

Neil, damn himself, shivered. Andrew, damn him, pressed down with his fingers. After a pause where he considered Neil’s reaction, his body language and expression, Andrew pushed down with his blunt nails and dragged with just enough pressure to where Neil didn’t know whether to feel pleasure or pain.

Andrew abruptly stood up and left the room, not waiting for Neil to follow. But of course Neil did.

*

“You can say no.”

“What?”

“I won’t make you do this if you don’t want to.”

“It’s fine.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not lying. Isn’t this your idea?”

“Neil. I won’t force you to do anything you don’t want to.”

“Andrew. It’s fine. It’s like you said. This place is boring. Let’s make out.”

“Neil.”

“Andrew. It’s a yes. Are you going to kiss me or not?”

*

Andrew hadn’t led Neil to either of their rooms. He seemed to be walking aimlessly down hallways, his gait relaxed and almost stumble-y. By the time Andrew stopped them, it was in a dusty stairwell that Andrew made Neil prop the door open with his shoe so it wouldn’t lock behind them. As soon as Neil straightened, Andrew was looking at him with hooded eyes. He didn’t look drugged anymore. He didn’t look anything at all.

“Keep your hands to yourself,” Andrew said, not taking a step toward Neil. Neil didn’t move either, suddenly confused. Was that how this usually worked?

But Neil didn’t really care. If that’s what Andrew wanted, fine. He shrugged. “Sure.”

Andrew still didn’t move, didn’t look away from Neil, his gaze intense. “Don’t touch me,” he said again, his voice hard. And Neil finally stopped looking at Andrew in anxious impatience, finally took stock of the words he was saying, why he was saying them with such intensity.

And Neil remembered that even though this was a place of refuge for him, a whim that he had subjected himself to for the sake of meager protection and three meals a day, it was a place of rehabilitation for everyone else—that everyone, that _Andrew,_ was here because they needed help, because something terrible may have happened to Andrew, so terrible that he needed to take drugs he became addicted to and didn’t want Neil to touch him while they fucked around.

Neil looked at Andrew, studied his face and his arms and the scars, and he said, “Okay. I won’t touch you,” with as much sincerity as his weary soul could offer. He might not understand what was going on, why Andrew was doing this, why Neil had agreed, but he could at least do that.

Andrew continued to stare at Neil, his expression so hard and the air so tense that Neil thought he might change his mind—he looked so angry all of a sudden—but then, quite abruptly, Andrew took a step forward, another, and then grabbed Neil’s chin. His eyes didn’t look pissed anymore. His fingers were unexpectedly warm.

So were his lips.

Neil closed his eyes, but he kept his arms limp at his sides. Even while his tongue slid into Andrew’s mouth. Even while teeth scraped his lips, his jaw, his neck. Even while Andrew’s hands wrapped lightly around his neck and he lost track of time and he couldn’t breathe or think or care about anything except for Andrew and what he was doing to him, Neil kept his hands to himself.

*

Andrew tested Neil’s control for three days. Andrew would find him at odd times during the day, in odd places, and drag him somewhere dark and secluded and ask him yes or no and kiss him when it was a yes.

It was always a yes.

Even when Andrew intercepted Neil in the middle of his run, and Neil was sweaty and heaving and clearly parched, Andrew would push him up against a tree hidden in the garden and ask and Neil would wheeze yes and Andrew would lick the trail of sweat trailing down his neck.

Neil said yes when Andrew sat next to him at the cafeteria, his tray full of food, having just sat down. Andrew leaned in and whispered yes or no and Neil said yes and stood up, abandoning his food, following Andrew to his bedroom, where Andrew pushed him up against the closed door and ran his hands up and down Neil’s clothed front, biting into his mouth, breathing Neil’s name into his mouth though he hadn’t meant to.

Neil said yes when Andrew beat him at chess. Neil said yes when Andrew lost to him at chess.

Neil said yes when Andrew found him sitting alone at a window sill, staring out at the rain, a dead look in his eye.

He said yes when Andrew asked.

And he always kept his hands to himself.

Even when Andrew leaned the whole length of him against Neil’s body, even when Andrew pulled one of Neil’s legs up and around his hip, even when Andrew, just once, grinded against him, Neil kept his arms at his side, not even a flinch, never a twitch, even while he gasped Andrew’s name, even while he shuddered.

Neil’s control never broke, but during one of their sessions, while Andrew held Neil’s hips and considered running his hands up Neil’s torso under his shirt, Neil hummed softly, almost like a whine, before leaning down and tasting Andrew’s neck, his mouth wet and warm, and then his tongue, and Andrew shivered.

Damn his body for giving him away. He turned his head to glare up at Neil, and Neil was grinning even as he said, “Sorry.” Andrew, still livid—at Neil, at himself—dug his fingers into Neil’s hips, over his shirt, and kissed him hard, teeth clacking against teeth and then the taste of blood, while he tried to decide if he hated that kiss, if he hated Neil, if he thought he was going to be sick, if Neil was enough to make him forget.

*

“I hear you are spending a lot of time with Andrew.”

“I guess.”

“It’s nice to find new friends, isn’t it?”

“I guess.”

“Sometimes it can help to give pieces of ourselves to strangers, because it feels like they don’t really know us to judge us. Is that how you feel around Andrew?”

“Not really. Am I supposed to feel that way around you?”

“Some people do. How doyou feel around me, Neil?”

“I feel like this is a big waste of time, and Andrew isn’t a stranger.”

“Then is he a friend?”

“I don’t know.”

*

The day that Andrew lost more dosage to his medication, Andrew grabbed Neil’s hands and placed them in his hair and said, “Just here,” before he stood still and let Neil kiss him. The less of his drugs remaining in his system, the more Andrew felt himself slipping away but also coming back, sick and tired and dead and alive. It felt like an end and a beginning, a sickness rising and a sickness purging. Andrew was vomiting less, smiling less, feeling less. Objects became more clear, people had more permanence, the haze lifting, and still Neil felt like a wisp, a cloud stuck behind glass, slowly evaporating with no way for Andrew to touch it, to stop it.

He let Neil touch his hair so that he could feel him, know he was real and in front of him, so Andrew could remember that even with the drugs leaving his system, something would remain real, even though the minute Andrew sent Neil on his way, flushed cheeks and glazed eyes, the cloud evaporated a little more, the feel of Neil’s fingers fading, the taste on his tongue swallowed.

*

After one of their after-run make outs, Andrew kept his face nestled in Neil’s neck while his breathing calmed down. They were leaning against a tree, and Neil smelled like sweat and grass and soap, and Andrew closed his eyes and wondered why he couldn’t catch his breath this time.

“Did you see Cecil this morning?” Neil asked, and Andrew became aware of Neil’s fingers fidgeting with the hair behind Andrew’s ear.

“What?”

“Cecil. He tried to teach me to play backgammon but he forgot how to play halfway through.”

“So who won?”

“I don’t know. Cecil congratulated Marta afterwards.”

“She wasn’t playing.”

“No, but how would I know? Cecil taught me how to play. Maybe she did win.”

Neil smoothed the piece of hair he was fiddling with behind Andrew’s ear before sliding his hand down and stopping, just there, at Andrew’s neck. Then Neil dropped a hesitant, chaste kiss on Andrew’s temple, and Andrew, annoyed, pulled away.

“What are you doing?”

Neil shrugged. “Talking to you.”

Andrew frowned. Glared at Neil. “I don’t like it.”

Neil hummed, but he was smiling, and Andrew left him by the tree.

*

The day that Andrew convinced Neil to take off his shirt was the day he put his hand down his pants. They started off this play over a game of chess. Though they normally played their games in silence with no repeats of Andrew’s first ploy of taking a piece and asking a question, Andrew shocked him this time by defeating one of Neil’s rooks and saying, “I want to take your shirt off.”

Neil, fighting through his warring emotions of startled, embarrassed, self-conscious, and, of course, aroused, hovered a hand over a pawn while he considered. “What, now?” he asked, to give himself time to consider. He moved his pawn, an easy take for Andrew, and waited.

“I want to see yours scars,” Andrew said, not looking up from the board. Andrew had set up an easy take for Neil, and Neil took a pawn.

“Why?” Neil asked.

Andrew moved a piece and Neil realized he was setting up for a checkmate. He didn’t feel like thinking hard enough to stop it. He moved a piece randomly, wondering if that would screw up Andrew’s plans inadvertently or make him closer to a win. Andrew played two more rounds without taking a piece before he vanquished Neil’s queen with his own and said, “I’m tired of you hiding.”

Neil, upset and angry, snapped, “I’m not hiding.” Andrew didn’t wait for Neil to take his turn, instead taking it for him so Andrew could make his final move. Neil had lost.

“Who are you running from?” Andrew asked, looking up at Neil finally. He was almost weaned completely off his medication now. There were no more deranged smiles or short attention spans. Andrew seemed almost real now, and sometimes Neil didn’t know how to handle him like this. Sometimes Neil felt sad.

“Why are you here, Andrew? Why did they make you take those drugs?” Neil parried, because he wasn’t going to give pieces of himself to Andrew without some in return.

“Are they going to kill you?” Andrew asked, ignoring Neil’s pettiness.

Neil still felt petty. “Why hasn’t anyone come to visit you? Called you?”

Andrew glared at Neil. Neil glared at Andrew. The blanket of their anger pressed hard around them, but Neil wasn’t just angry at Andrew; he was angry at all of it. He hadn’t thought Andrew was as alone as him, but when he noticed that Andrew wasn’t called for visitors and made no phone calls, a swell of anger filled Neil’s chest. For some reason, he didn’t like the thought that Andrew would leave this place with no one to go back to.

Andrew suddenly stopped glaring, as if the balloon of his anger suddenly popped. Deflated and numb, Andrew replied, “My family is of no concern to you.”

“So you do have one?” Neil all but sneered, but his anger was dissipating as well. He suddenly felt very tired.

“Barely.” Andrew paused, as if waiting for Neil to continue, but Neil had his answer. Andrew eventually asked, “Will you die when you leave this place?”

Neil shrugged, looking away. “I hope not.”

“Don’t do that.” Andrew’s voice was hard. Neil, confused, looked back at Andrew, but his expression was still null and void.

He asked, “Do what?” but Andrew didn’t answer. He just stood up and walked away.

But Neil, of course, followed.

*

Andrew led Neil to the stairwell they used that first day, but instead of just standing in the middle of the landing, Andrew pushed Neil up against the wall opposite the door, propped open again with Neil’s shoe. He kept one palm on his chest and stared up at Neil and waited and waited until Neil finally sighed and nodded.

Neil moved his hands to the bottom of his shirt, but Andrew stopped him, placing his own on top of Neil’s. They stood there like that a while, breathing each other in, waiting, and then Andrew yanked the shirt off Neil and tossed it behind him.

It was cold in the stairwell, and Neil’s skin was soon covered in gooseflesh. Andrew, without thinking, brought his hands up and rubbed warmth into Neil’s skin, across his pecks and around the girth of his shoulders, until Neil’s skin was smooth and warm, until it was flushed and Andrew could feel Neil’s heartbeat under his fingertips.

But Andrew could also feel the ridges under his fingertips, the slashes and gashes, the road rash, the iron burn.

The bullet hole.

Andrew traced that scar, circled it with his index finger, while he looked at the wasteland that was Neil’s abdomen. He looked at his own hand holding Neil at the waist, just above his pants. He wanted to ask again, _who are you running from, are they going to kill you_ , but Andrew didn’t want to speak right now, didn’t want to do anything.

“Andrew,” Neil said in a very soft voice, and Andrew leaned forward and kissed Neil on the left side of his chest, right over his heart. He left his lips there for a minute, and then he kissed and nipped a trail up Neil’s chest, his neck, his lips, while the finger tracing the bullet scar moved decidedly down.

The kiss grew more frantic the lower Andrew’s fingers trailed, and then Neil was gasping against his lips and Andrew was moving, fast and unforgiving, until it was over and Neil was breathing Andrew’s name. Neil’s hands had remained at his sides, clenched in tight fists, but his body was leaning heavily into Andrew’s, solid and warm.

But even after all that, Andrew’s fingers sticky and Neil panting in his ear, whispering nonsense, Andrew stared down at Neil’s ravaged skin and still thought that nothing felt real, that nothing was ever real in this place, Neil most of all.

*

One night Andrew followed Neil to his room when it was lights out. They were both a little sluggish after the celebratory birthday dinner for one of the other patients, and as soon as Neil’s door was closed behind him, Andrew sat on the bed and gestured for Neil to stand in front of him. Neil stood before him, staring down and right at Andrew as if he could see him, even in the dark, and Andrew closed his eyes.

“Don’t,” he said.

“What?” Neil asked, but his voice was a whisper, and soon Andrew felt Neil’s fingers combing his hair back from his forehead.

He allowed the ministration two more times, his scalp tingling, before he demanded, “Stop,” and leaned away from Neil’s touch. Neil immediately dropped his hand and took a step back. Andrew opened his eyes and looked at Neil, who was still staring at him like that, and Andrew felt very big and very small. He was no longer on his medication. He didn’t know how much time they had left.

He scooted himself back on Neil’s bed, his back against the wall, his legs straight in front of him, and said, “Come here.”

Neil climbed onto the bed, on top of Andrew, straddling his thighs, and almost as soon as he was settled Neil leaned down and kissed Andrew on the lips, once, and then his chin, and then his neck, where he stayed a while, and Andrew slid his hands over Neil’s shoulders and down his back and pulled Neil’s shirt over his head. He put his hands on Neil’s lower back and pulled him forward forcefully, until they were chest to chest, and Neil returned to kissing Andrew’s lips, opening his mouth, tasting him, his hands now cradling Andrew’s neck, thumbs in the hollow beneath his ears, and Andrew fumbled with the front of Neil’s pants and pulled him out and leaned back so he could watch Neil lose himself and lose himself and fall.

But Neil smiled sleepily down at Andrew, and Andrew stared for a minute before he dropped his head on Neil’s collarbone and breathed heavily through his arousal, wanting to leave, wanting to stay.

Neil dropped his hands from Andrew’s shoulders and leaned back but didn’t get off of his lap, and they stayed that way, breathing and breathing, until Andrew pushed Neil away and left his room. Already he forgot the taste of Neil. He wanted to go back.

He didn’t.

*

Andrew met Neil on his run again, but they didn’t find a hidden tree. Instead, Neil slowed to a walk and Andrew walked beside him and they circled the garden for an hour, two, until one of the nurses found them and said it was time for Andrew’s therapy session.

That night, Andrew pulled Neil into his bed and laid them chest to back, Andrew kissing along Neil’s shoulders and fingers roaming into Neil’s pants. Neil held his own arms above him, wrist to wrist, as if Andrew had tied him that way, and gasped as Andrew grabbed him. He tried not to usually, but this time he couldn’t help moving along with Andrew’s pace, and he couldn’t help how often he said Andrew’s name, or how he said it, or how he closed his eyes, or how he wished they didn’t have to leave even though he didn’t want to stay.

*

_Fuck,_ Neil had whispered that night when he came, trembling against Andrew’s chest, making a real mess of his sheets, and Andrew couldn’t get the sound of it out of his head, all night, all morning, all day.

The drugs were all gone. He hadn’t vomited in days.

*

“Neil,” Andrew said one night as they lay side by side, facing each other, Neil’s clothes on the floor, Andrew’s shirt tangled at their feet.

“Andrew,” Neil said back. He was tracing the lines of Andrew’s face: the outline of his lips, the bridge of his nose, the contours of his jaw, and Andrew couldn’t breathe.

“Are they going to kill you?” he asked.

“Will your family pick you up?” Neil whispered back.

“Neil,” Andrew said again.

Neil smiled, tracing Andrew’s lips again, over and over.

“I hate you,” Andrew told him.

Neil closed his eyes. “I would, too,” he whispered, and then he pushed two fingers into Andrew’s mouth, and Andrew sucked.

*

They told Andrew his coach had been contacted about his release in a few days. Andrew couldn’t remember what the world was like outside of the hospital. He couldn’t remember what was real anymore. All he could seem to remember was the weightless way he felt when he tried to remember the sound of Neil’s voice soon after Andrew had sent him away, the feel of his hands on his skin, the way he looked in his bed.

Andrew felt like he was forgetting Neil the minute he was out of sight, and he didn’t know how he was supposed to keep him, didn’t know if he could.

*

“When will you leave?” Andrew asked over one of their last chess games.

“I don’t know,” Neil answered. He thought maybe he’d try this game, but Andrew met his challenge, and Neil could tell the way the game was going to go by the third round. Oh well.

“What will you do?” Andrew asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Neil.”

Neil smiled, looking down at the board. Neil knew Andrew didn’t like it when he did that. When Neil didn’t say anything, Andrew took his turn, except he moved a pawn like a knight. Neil looked up and raised a brow, but Andrew was just staring back at him, still waiting for an answer.

Neil moved a bishop like a rook, and Andrew his knight like a queen.

“Checkmate,” Andrew said, but Neil moved his king like a bishop and the game kept going.

*

Andrew held one of Neil’s legs over his hip while he grinded into him, fast and hard, Neil’s fingers digging into his back, hanging on, with Andrew’s own tangled in Neil’s hair. Andrew stared at his fingers in wonder while their bodies rocked together, trying to commit to memory the feel of Neil’s hair, when he noticed that his roots were a different color than the rest, that instead of a dark brown they were an autumn red.

“Your hair,” Andrew grunted, because he didn’t stop moving, couldn’t stop moving.

“Yeah,” Neil breathed, moving his hands from Andrew’s back to rest above him on the bed, grasping at the pillow there, trying to keep pace with Andrew. Close now, Andrew buried his face in Neil’s neck and bit down just to have something to do, and Neil’s back arched as he trembled, and Andrew soon followed.

Andrew was leaving slow, sweaty kissed on Neil’s neck, and Neil was drawing aimless patterns on Andrew’s stomach, and Andrew asked, “Where will you go?”

Neil didn’t answer, just kept drawing circles until he fell asleep. Andrew immediately forgot what shade of blue they were.

*

On Andrew’s last day, Neil wasn’t around. Andrew felt something tight in his stomach crawling its way up his throat, and when he walked out into the lobby to meet his cousin and brother and Kevin, alone, he stopped, for just a minute, to ask his doctor, “Where’s Neil?”

The doctor, sympathetic, said, “I imagine he didn’t get the chance to tell you, with how quick it happened. But one of his family members came to pick him up, and Neil checked himself out.”

The tight thing in Andrew’s throat choked him.


	2. ii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i just felt like splitting it up even tho i'm posting them both now lol

Wymack’s phone rang. Scowling at the unknown number, he answered gruffly, “Wymack.”

“Um,” the person on the other line said after a short pause. “Is…Andrew available?”

“What?” The person on the other line sounded like a kid, except his voice was raspy and dragging, as if every word forced out of his throat hurt. “What the fuck do you want with Andrew?” Wymack continued.

“I…um.” Wymack, suspicious, waited him out. “Can you tell him that Neil is looking for him?”

“ _Who_?”

“He can reach me at this number.”

“Kid, what the fuck—” But the line went dead. Wymack pinched the bridge of his nose. He really didn’t want to deal with Minyard more than he had to right now. Ever since he had returned from Easthaven a week ago, Andrew had been more volatile than when he left but at unpredictable times—he’d be fine one minute, impassive and blank, and then something would set him off, and it was almost like he was on his meds again, except he wasn’t smiling or drugged out of his mind.

He was just angry.

Wymack sighed. He walked out to his foxes running drills and whistled for them to stop. “Coach?” Nicky was the first to ask as they all piled around him, Andrew on the outskirts, staring at nothing.

“Minyard,” he snapped, trying to get his goalie’s attention.

Andrew slid his bored gaze to Wymack. Wymack thought for a moment to mention the boy’s name now, in front of everyone, but he had a feeling that might set him off. Then again, so could separating him from the pack. Wymack thought of the boy’s raspy, hesitant voice and decided to do this in private.

“Take five. I need Andrew.” Wymack turned and stomped back to his office. 

Once there, he stood beside his desk, arms folded, and watched as Andrew walked in and stood on the other side of the desk. Wymack looked at the blonde, considering, for a long moment. Long enough that Andrew started to fiddle with the papers on his desk, reordering them and even brushing a few into the trash.

“Stop that,” Wymack said. Andrew did not. “Who the fuck is Neil?” he asked bluntly, and Andrew’s hands stopped folding one of his papers into a paper airplane.

Andrew looked up. Waited a beat, and then asked, “Where is he?”

“I don’t fucking know. Who is he?”

Andrew looked around Wymack’s desk until he found his phone, and then he picked it up and started going through it.

“Hey,” Wymack growled, but he didn’t stop him.

Eventually, Andrew found the call history screen and, after studying it, said, “Not Easthaven.”

“Why the fuck would they be calling me? You’re out.”

“Who called you?”

“Neil. Who the fuck is he?”

“Is this his number?”

Wymack narrowed his eyes. “Andrew. Who is he?”

Andrew dropped Wymack’s phone in the trash before he turned to walk out the door.

*

“Hello?”

“Where are you?”

“Andrew?”

“Neil. Why do you sound like that?”

“Andrew.”

“Where are you?”

“I don’t know the address, hold on—”

“ _Neil._ ”

“Just hold on, I’ll find it.”

*

It took Andrew an hour to get to the address Neil told him. It was a nondescript apartment building in a town twenty minutes outside of Columbia, and Andrew didn’t know what he was doing here.

He knocked on the door.

*

Neil took a steeling breath. He touched the bandage on his neck briefly, just once, and suppressed the phantom fear that rose. It was over now. It was over.

Neil opened the door to Andrew standing in front of him. He wore black armbands, and Neil, suddenly so happy to see Andrew again when he thought he never would, smiled crookedly around the bandages on his face.

“Hey,” he rasped and didn’t notice until then the utter stillness Andrew was standing with. Unbidden, reflexively, Neil touched his bandaged throat. “Um.” Andrew stared, didn’t seem to be breathing. Neil stepped aside, making room for Andrew to come in. After another minute, with deceptive calm, he walked into the apartment. Neil closed the door behind him, locking it.

Neil watched Andrew as he surveyed the apartment. There was nothing in it, no furniture, no food. Neil said, “Not much they could do for me when I refused their help.”

Andrew wouldn’t turn to look at him. He stared out the front window. “Help?”

“The FBI.”

“Why?”

“I wouldn’t be able to find you again if I went with them.”

Neil watched Andrew’s fists clench.

“Andrew,” he said softly, and Andrew shook his head.

“Don’t.”

“Hey,” Neil tried again, and took a step forward.

“Stop.” Neil stopped. “What happened?” Andrew demanded, and Neil swallowed, though it hurt his throat. Everything hurt his throat.

“They found me.”

“How.”

“I don’t know.”

“I thought it was your foolproof plan.”

“I thought it was, too.”

“Neil.”

“Andrew. Look at me.”

Andrew would not look at him. He said, “I said I would protect you.”

“As long as I was there, you said. As long as I didn’t leave before you did.”

“How long did you know?”

“What?”

“How long.”

“They started calling me.”

“When?”

Neil shrugged. Andrew couldn’t see, and so he turned around, and Neil just stared at Andrew’s face while Andrew stared back.

“Neil. When did they start calling you.”

“Maybe a month ago?”

“A month.”

“I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

“Neil. You were supposed to tell me.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“They would have hurt you.”

“I don’t care.”

“Well, I do.”

Andrew closed his eyes, and Neil saw that his fists were shaking. “Who were you running from?” he asked.

“My father. Who picked you up from the hospital?”

“My brother. My cousin. A teammate.”

Neil smiled softly, even though Andrew couldn’t see with his eyes still closed. Neil saw that Andrew’s whole body was now shaking. “Who slit your throat?” he asked.

“My father,” Neil answered. He almost did die that night. His father had slit his throat as soon as the FBI stormed the basement, using Neil as leverage until he realized it was futile. Thankfully, there were EMTs following down the stairs to staunch the blood flow just as Neil was sliced and collapsed to the floor, but Neil had still fallen under and hadn’t expected to wake up again.

“And the rest?”

“My face and arms? His people.”

Andrew opened his eyes, immediately looking at his arms, and Neil forgot he was wearing a sweatshirt to cover the bandages and his hands were in his pockets.

“Show me.”

“Help me.” Neil held out his arms, like he didn’t know how to take off his own jacket, and Andrew, after a pause, stepped forward, reaching out. Neil dipped his head to hide his smile.

*

When Andrew finally peeled the bandage off Neil’s neck, it felt like all the air had left. Neil was breathing shallowly, and Andrew wasn’t breathing at all, just staring at the stitched, scabbing wound. There was ointment slathered thick on top of it, but even it wasn’t enough to relieve the sensitive skin, and Andrew could see the precise stitches that caught on the still healing skin and bled every time Neil moved.

And everything was suddenly so very, very real: Neil, here in front of him, his voice and breath and warmth and blood, and Andrew—

Andrew couldn’t—

he didn’t want—

He stood suddenly, unsure what to do. He wanted to leave but he didn’t want to leave Neil alone but he couldn’t be in this room anymore and he couldn’t look at Neil’s neck anymore and he wanted to hit something, so he wandered around the empty apartment, the empty rooms, and stopped in the bathroom, took two deep breaths, and punched the mirror. He readied his fist to punch again, even though he was already bleeding, blood on the floor, when Neil said softly behind him, “Don’t.”

Andrew punched the fractured mirror again.

“That’s my only piece of furniture, Andrew,” Neil said, sighing, and Andrew looked at Neil in the fragmented shards of glass. Andrew was so angry he couldn’t breathe, and he stared at Neil as he produced a bag of bandages and pills and ointment seemingly from thin air. “Good thing I just came from the hospital, huh?”

*

Neil picked out the pieces of mirror and cleaned and wrapped Andrew’s hand, which had finally stopped shaking. Neither said anything about Andrew’s tantrum, didn’t say anything at all until Neil, finished doctoring, brought Andrew’s hand to his lips and dropped a soft kiss.

“I fucking hate you,” Andrew told him, but he didn’t move his hand away. Instead, his shifted so that his hand hovered just over the burned skin of Neil’s cheek, brushing a thumb across the skin a few times.

Neil smiled. “Someone probably should.”

Andrew leaned forward and pressed a lingering kiss on Neil’s lips, both of them standing perfectly still, barely breathing.

“Do you want dinner?” Neil asked eventually, when he needed to breathe, when he needed to think, when he remembered he was alive and Andrew was in front of him and all he had to do reach out and he’d be there.

“Do you even have anything to eat?” Andrew asked, stepping out of Neil’s space.

“No. But we can get something from this, right?” Neil held up his new smart phone. “I literally have no idea what to do with this.”

Andrew closed his eyes, sighing a long suffering _Jesus fucking Christ,_ andheld out his hand for Neil’s phone. Neil grinned. 

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for being here. i might write one more, where andrew and neil are in college with the foxes together


End file.
